Though this title is prohibitively expensive for casual readers, I certainly recommend for this to be read by all students of recent German history, of the 'surveillance State,' and of bureaucratic overkill in general. The best choice would be to pick up an used copy of this book, obviously, but whatever investment you make will be rewarded with some very competent research on Mr. Schmeidel's part.
I originally chanced upon this while doing research on the West German RAF [Rote Armee Fraktion]terror organization, whose links to the Stasi are implied in many other [English-language] texts on that group, but rarely explored in depth. For this reasons alone, this book is fairly unique among the other Stasi-related volumes, and very useful for completists of information on either group. Here at last we can understand the full extent to which the West German subversives were allowed access to the intelligence of the East, or to the weapons and funding thereof, and we can rightly question the degree to which these "New Left" commandos really deviated from the "Old Left" ideologies of the East. There now exists an 800-page volume on the RAF which completely glosses over this activity (partly because that one is an unabashedly sympathetic and supportive book on a far-Left imprint), yet even the more even-handed portrayals (e.g. Stefan Aust's work) do not really mine the Stasi-RAF connection in substantial detail.
The broader relationship between the German counter-culture / sub-culture and the state security apparatus is also competently revealed, citing those cases in which groups managed to slip through the cracks (e.g. punk music fans being seen as too "numerically insignificant" to bother pursuing), while also capably documenting the many cases of collusion between the infamous "IM" ['inoffizielle mitarbeiter'] informants and other institutions like the church. Schmeidel's knowledge of what typically went on in the life of a rank-and-file "IM" is revelatory, with a couple of case studies being offered for good measure.
The discussion of the Stasi's bewildering departmental / organizational breakdown, in less capable hands, would jar with the more "sexy" material on international terrorism and what have you - however, Schmeidel manages to spice things up with humorous turns of phrase here and there, and clearly does his best to maintain an air of vitality when he is painting a picture of this organization's triumphantly banal form of evil.
All in all, a deceptively slim book that will satisfy most researchers' curiosities while still leaving open avenues of further exploration.
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Le recensioni migliori da altri paesi
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Eliane Lundberg-TanakaRecensito negli Stati Uniti il 8 gennaio 2013
solid and nuanced overview
Formato: Copertina rigidaAcquisto verificato
